Siwa Oasis travel guide

This green, fertile hollow spanned by a sky that is always cloudless has several hundred springs, most of which have a temperature of 24 – 30 °C

However, it is not a single oasis but a whole group of them in a depression that lies up to 17m/56ft below sea level. Even in ancient times, up to 2,000 wells and the associated irrigation systems were maintained in the oasis. Palm groves, vineyards, orchards, and fields of grain were cultivated. However, increased salination was a constant problem, so that new wellsand canal systems were built over the centuries. Through deep drilling over the past few years, it has been established that there is enough water to cultivate the world-famous Siwa date palms, olive trees, orange trees, winter vegetables, grain, and many other plants. Meanwhile, construction of canals to the west and south has begun, in order to take excess oasis water into the desert. The plan is to create more cultivated land in this manner. There are even plans to build a vacation village with a golf course, spa hotel, swimming pools, and a real airport. The end of Siwa’s isolation has been decided. Most of the oasis residents are descendants of the Berbers, who have mixed with Bedouin and Sudanese slaves in the course of history. They speak their own Berber dialect in addition to Arabic. Recently, many new settlers have come to the Siwa oasis from the Nile valley; mainly construction experts, technicians, officials, and teachers. In ancient Egypt, the oasis of Siwa was home to an important and also mysterious oracle of the god Amun and later Zeus-Ammon. In the 6th century BC, the priests foretold the death and destruction of the Persian ruler Kambyses, who thereupon sent his army into the Western Desert in order to destroy all life in the oasis of Siwa. However, the advancing Persians were soon surprised by a severe sandstorm and lost their lives. Since then, residents of the oasis have believed that the uniqueness of this fertile area in the eastern Sahara was ordained by the god Amun.Around 450 BC, Herodotustravelled the Western Desert and also visited the oasis of Siwa. The first accounts of the oasis were recorded by him. Alexander the Great travelled to Siwa in 331 BC as the conqueror of Egypt. Here, he had the oracle confirm him as the son of Zeus-Ammon and as a god and king. In Roman and early Christian times, residents of the oasis stayed true to the pharaonic-era worship of Ammon. The later history of the oasis from the 7th century until the 1960s is recorded in the so-called Siwan manuscript, which also reports on individual clans, manners, and customs. The oasis did not come to the attention of the world again until the 20th century. Field Marshal Erwin Rommel wanted to use it as the base for a major offensive in 1942. Rusty vehicles of the German army still bear witness to this fact. Since 1977, the oasis has had renewed strategic importance, as the Egyptian president Sadat established an air force base here in order to attack terrorist camps in neighbouring Libya. At the time, the road from Cairo to Siwa via Mersa Matruhwas also hurriedly asphalted.

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